Posts Tagged North Riverside Fire Department

North Riverside Fire Department news

Sep 23

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | Comments off

On Sept. 14, the village charged North Riverside Firefighters Local 2714 with surface bargaining and improperly bargaining, saying the union has forced an impasse in negotiations by insisting on the elimination of the village’s private paramedic service provider, Paramedic Services of Illinois (PSI).

“The union has demanded the village terminate its contract with PSI as condition of any agreement,” the village’s complaint states.

The village filed the complaint with the state labor board after the two sides met on Aug. 31 and Sept. 8.

But the union’s attorney waved off the complaint, saying those two meetings weren’t bargaining sessions at all and that the village has not complied with last month’s state labor board’s ruling … that required the village to post notice of the violations, rescind the termination notices, and bargain in good faith. But the village has not posted the notice or rescinded the termination notices, according to the union’s attorney.

Instead, the village has appealed the labor board’s ruling to the Illinois Appellate Court.

There are now two matters involving the two-year old contract dispute between North Riverside and its firefighters before the appellate court. The first is the village’s appeal of a Cook County Circuit Court judge’s ruling that she did not have jurisdiction over the village’s call for unilateral termination of the firefighters’ union contract.

That matter has been in the appellate court’s hands for 11 months. Now the village has appealed the state labor board’s unfair labor practice ruling.

Meanwhile, the North Riverside mayor said that despite the pending court matters, he wants to come to an agreement with firefighters and that the meetings on Aug. 31 and Sept. 8 were part of that effort.

“[The fire union] knew those were serious sessions,” said Hermanek. “We went there fully ready to bargain and get an agreement.”

Yet, correspondence between the two sides in the run up to those negotiating sessions indicate that they were approaching those meetings carefully.

In an Aug. 19 letter to village officials, union President Rick Urbinati requested a meeting with the village’s bargaining team, but made it clear discussions would include implementation of the labor board’s order.

When the two sides met, the village handed the union discussion items related to a new contract, but the village’s attorney made clear that it was not considered a contract offer or proposal.

The mayor called that language a legal formality because of the pending litigation. He also complained that the union wouldn’t budge from its insistence on replacing PSI paramedics with low-cost part-time employees for a time while firefighters are trained to be paramedics.

The union contract and PSI’s contract with the village are separate deals, the mayor said. He pointed to a new, unprecedented five-year contract with police officers and a new deal with police dispatchers as examples of the village’s interest in negotiating union contracts.

Berry acknowledged that the firefighters’ union was seeking termination of the PSI contract, “but as a part of a negotiated settlement.”

The union wasn’t about to let go of its wish to terminate PSI’s contract, Berry said, when the village still won’t rescind termination notices it has issued to union firefighters.

“They are still proposing to replace us.”

thanks Dan

Tags: North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department, North Riverside Fire Department, North Riverside Firefighters Local 2714, North Riverside negotiating with firefighter's union, Paramedic Services of Illinois, Rick Urbinati president of the North Riverside Firefighters Union-Local 2714

New tower ladder for North Riverside

Sep 10

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News, Fire Truck photos, New Delivery | 11 Comments

This from Josh Boyajian:

North Riverside’s new Tower Ladder 806

Josh Boyajian photo

Tags: Josh Boyajian, New tower ladder for North Riverside FD, North Riverside FD buys Pierce demo, North Riverside Fire Department, Pierce Velocity tower ladder

North Riverside Fire Department news

Aug 12

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | Comments off

Excerpts from the RBLandmark.com:

The Illinois Labor Relations Board last month ruled that the village had not engaged in surface bargaining with union firefighters before declaring an impasse, filing a lawsuit arguing the village had the right to void its union contract and issuing termination letters to all union firefighters in late 2014.

However, the labor board in a 4 to 1 vote on July 12 also ruled that the village had no right to unilaterally terminate its collectively bargained contract with firefighters.

“For us to decide the contract be terminated … brings us dangerously close to modifying the [Illinois Public Labor Relations Act], and that’s not our role,” said John Hartnett, chairman of the Illinois Labor Relations Board during the July 12 hearing in Springfield. “Our role is to interpret the act.”

Still, it was clear that there was some sympathy for the village’s position that it was acting as a result of precarious financial circumstances.

“When the employer is faced with a critical financial challenge, the village asks how it truly terminates a contract and a bargaining relationship that involved protected service employees so as to be able to pursue more cost-effective options for delivery of such services,” said Kathryn Zeldon-Nelson, attorney for the labor board.

Was the only alternative, Zeldon-Nelson wondered going through arbitration and “trusting the interest arbitrator to take cognizance of [the village’s] financial constraints”?

Just what it all means in terms of firefighters and the village coming to terms on a new contract is unclear, because not all of the loose ends remaining from the initial push to privatize firefighting services in the summer of 2014 have been tied up.

Both sides still await word from the Illinois Court of Appeals regarding Cook County Circuit Court Judge Diane Larsen’s October 2015 ruling that she didn’t have jurisdiction over the matter.

Also pending is contract arbitration that was demanded by the union and held in abeyance by the arbitrator until the circuit court case was disposed.

J. Dale Berry, the attorney for North Riverside Firefighters Local 2714, said he didn’t expect the appellate court to rule “for several months.”

Hermanek called the labor board’s decision that the village had not engaged in surface bargaining a major victory for the village.

Berry, however, said the labor board upheld the crux of the union’s argument – that the village could not unilaterally terminate the union contract or change the employment status of the firefighters.

“If he thinks that’s a major victory for the village, I’ll take the loss then,” Berry said.

thanks Dan

Tags: North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department, North Riverside files lawsuit in hopes of privatizing the fire department, North Riverside Fire Department, village may privatize fire department

New tower ladder for North Riverside

Jun 14

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News, Fire Truck photos, New Delivery | 4 Comments

This from Josh Boyajian:

Pierce demo tower ladder being purchased by the North Riverside FD.

Pierce photo

Tags: New tower ladder for North Riverside FD, North Riverside FD buys Pierce demo, North Riverside Fire Department, Pierce Velocity tower ladder

North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department (more)

Jun 1

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | 1 Comment

Excerpts from the RBLandmark.com:

On the heels of a fiscal year in which every single fund, from general operation to water to waste hauling ended in the black, North Riverside’s finance director on May 24 said the village is in its best financial position since prior to the economic crash of 2008.

Although the figures are not yet audited, revenues for the second straight fiscal year reportedly outpaced expenditures in the village’s general operating fund, which pays for day-to-day expenses such as salaries and benefits, including pension contributions, by nearly $200,000.

And for the second straight year, North Riverside’s water enterprise fund, which for two decades operated at a loss because the village’s general fund subsidized costs it now passes along to customers, also ended in the black by about $430,000.

During the second of two meetings to discuss the proposed 2016-17 fiscal year budget, Scarpiniti on May 24 also said the village will be in a stronger position to argue its case for an improved bond rating when village officials meet with the Moody’s rating service later this month.

Should the village’s bond rating improve, officials would be poised in the next six to eight months to issue between $2.2 million and $2.5 million in alternate revenue bonds to fund a major street improvement campaign along with a handful of other capital expenditures identified in the 2016-17 budget.

The debt service on the alternate revenue bonds would be funded by earmarking roughly $250,000 in revenue the village receives from its places of eating and drinking tax. The village will raise that tax to a full 2 percent from the present 1 percent in 2016-17, which should result in an additional $460,000 annually.

Another major purchase coming in 2016-17 is a new aerial ladder truck for the fire department, which is being financed via an installment contract with Pierce Manufacturing, at a cost to the village $1.16 million.

It replaces a 1997 Pierce aerial that has been out of service with an inoperable main ladder since 2014. The fire department will take delivery of the new truck sometime in July, according to Fire Chief Brian Basek, and will attempt to find a buyer for its old truck.

The numbers in the 2016-17 budget also indicate that the village’s two-year campaign to privatize its fire department may be coming to an end.

While the village is still pinning its hopes on a reversal of a circuit court decision by the Illinois Appellate Court and favorable responses to village protests of a proposed unfair labor practice ruling by the Illinois Labor Relations Board, the budget indicates North Riverside’s investment in those fights is over.

The budget includes no money allocated for privatization in the new fiscal year and a much lower budget figure for fighting union grievances, most of which have come from firefighters in the past three years.

After spending $47,721 in legal fees regarding fire department issues in 2013-14, North Riverside spent $265,762 in 2014-15 and an estimated $252,475 in 2015-16.

The legal services budget for the fire department in the fiscal year ending April 30, 2017 is estimated at $100,000, a majority of that for contract negotiations and grievance proceedings. The mayor and firefighters have been meeting informally for several months. On May 24, Hermanek said he’d agree to a contract with the union and hire three more firefighters if the union would agree to reduce the number of firefighters allowed to call off during a single shift.

Right now, two people are allowed to call off during a shift, a policy that Hermanek said is responsible for skyrocketing overtime costs that have prevented the village from hiring more employees.

The overtime problem would be solved if the union would reduce the number of people asking for a shift off from two to one, however the union won’t budge, Hermanek said.

thanks Dan

Tags: North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department, North Riverside Fire Department, North Riverside Fire Department tower ladder, North Riverside negotiating with firefighter's union

Towns plan to consolidate emergency dispatch

May 18

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News, Fire Service News | 1 Comment

Excerpts from the RBLandmark.com:

The Illinois General Assembly has given small towns all across the state an order to consolidate their emergency police and fire dispatch centers by mid-2017, forcing municipalities to scramble to either join existing dispatch centers or form their own.

And by July 1 the state wants written plans for just how such consolidation is going to be handled — a task that has brought Brookfield, North Riverside and Riverside together to form a joint dispatch center.

Tentatively called WC3, the joint dispatch center for all three villages will be located inside the North Riverside Police Department and will be governed by a board of directors that will hire an executive director to manage operations.

Earlier this month, all three villages signed off on a consulting contract to hire Northbrook-based GovHR USA for $25,000 to assist them in implementing the plan. Representatives from all three villages, including village managers, police and fire chiefs, and dispatch supervisors have been meeting weekly with GovHR USA consultant Paul Harlow, who formerly served as village manager and public safety director of Glencoe.

Last summer, the General Assembly passed the consolidated dispatch law bill which mandates that all towns with populations less than 25,000 consolidate services to reach that population. The cost to create the joint dispatch center would be borne equally by all three municipalities.

There are many moving parts to the consolidation process. In addition to physically upgrading the North Riverside dispatch center to include a third position and some new equipment, Brookfield is not presently on the same dispatch radio frequency as Riverside and North Riverside, and Brookfield belongs to a different fire department mutual aid division.

In addition, the records software used by North Riverside and Brookfield is not used by Riverside, and all dispatchers will need to be trained to provide what’s called Emergency Medical Dispatch (EMD), which is a higher level of dispatch service that’s being mandated along with the consolidation. While some of the dispatchers currently employed have been trained in EMD, none of the three villages presently provides EMD service because it requires a second dispatcher to be on hand 24 hours a day.

All three towns say the full-time dispatchers they currently employ will be retained, but the future of part-timers is not so clear. Eventually, however, the dispatchers will go from being municipal employees to being employees of WC3, and a new collective bargaining unit will be created for those employees, who are now members of three separate units.

One of the other changes that will come as dispatch services consolidate is that Brookfield and Riverside police will no longer have personnel at their front desks 24 hours a day. During the overnight hours, North Riverside will have dispatch personnel available to handle walk-ins, but some sort of phone/video system will need to be installed at Brookfield and Riverside to allow anyone walking up to the front doors of those departments to reach a dispatcher in North Riverside.

In June, all three municipalities will sign an intergovernmental agreement to set up the WC3 board, which will include officials who have already been meeting informally with the consultant.

Tags: Brookfield Fire Department, Emergency Medical Dispatch, new joint dispatch center planned for Brookfield Riverside and North Riverside, North Riverside Fire Department, Riverside Fire Department, Towns plan to consolidate emergency dispatch, WC3 emergency dispatch center

North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department (more)

Mar 29

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | Comments off

Excerpts from the RBLandmark.com:

An administrative law judge for the Illinois Labor Relations Board has ordered the village of North Riverside to rescind termination notices issued to firefighters in October 2014 and ordered it back to the bargaining table after rejecting the village’s claim that it had the right to unilaterally terminate the union contract.

Anna Hamburg-Gal, in a recommended decision and order dated March 25, ruled that the village engaged in unfair labor practices related to their plan to privatize firefighting services and outsource them to Paramedic Services of Illinois, which has provided paramedic services for the village for decades.

Specifically, according to Hamburg-Gal, the village engaged in what is known as “surface” bargaining when it met with the union during the late summer and early fall of 2014 to negotiate a new contract with firefighters.

The most recent union contract expired April 30, 2014, but the two sides did not sit down at the bargaining table until June 24, 2014. Months prior to that, however, the village had been planning to privatize the fire department.

In early January 2014, according to the recommended decision and order, Mayor Hubert Hermanek Jr. met with Village Attorney Burt Odelson to discuss whether privatization was feasible.

By sometime in February 2014, Hermanek had met with officials from PSI to see if the company could provide firefighting services and to tell them that the village wouldn’t seek competitive bids, the decision states.

In June of that year, PSI presented the village with an estimate that predicted the firm could provide firefighting services at savings of about $1 million compared to what the village was paying its union firefighters. Even before sitting down with the union at the bargaining table, the village published a letter to residents pitching privatization as an alternative.

Hamburg-Gal ruled that the village’s quick rejection of union proposals to consolidate firefighting services into a fire protection district or to form a private company that would serve to provide qualified firefighters to the village “indicate a rush to reach impasse rather than meaningful consideration of the union’s proposals.”

Arguments that the village didn’t have time to go through a referendum petition process for consolidation, stated Hamburg-Gal, were undercut by a village proposal to offer firefighters an 11-year contract that would gradually phase out union firefighters and replace them with PSI employees.

North Riverside “was willing to wait 11 years required to reap the full cost-savings of its own privatization plan,” Hamburg-Gal wrote. “Surely, a modicum of investigation into the union’s novel cost-savings proposal would not have taken so long.”

The recommended decision and order also states that the village improperly changed the terms and conditions of employment while interest arbitration was pending and “interfered, restrained and coerced employees” when the village issued termination notices shortly after the union invoked interest arbitration proceedings.

Hamburg-Gal rejected the village’s contention that it had the right to unilaterally terminate its contract with firefighters, who are considered “protective service employees” and are not allowed to strike.

Rather, she wrote, the law’s “specific prohibition against unilateral changes to protective service unit employees’ terms and conditions of employment applies where the employees at issue are firefighters.”

J. Dale Berry, the attorney representing the firefighters’ union said the village’s interpretation of the law was “ridiculous” and the recommended decision highlighted that.

“The cornerstone of their strategy was the [interpretation] of [that part of the law], and she rejected it as being without merit,” Berry said.

In response to the recommended decision and order, Hermanek told the Landmark that the absence of any sanctions, such as awarding the union its demand for the village to pay its attorneys’ fees, was a win for the village.

Hermanek and union leaders have met informally several times since late 2015, and the mayor said he hopes both sides can still reach an agreement beneficial to both sides.

“Without sanctioning us, she’s telling us to bargain with them,” Hermanek said. “That’s what I’ve been doing. I’m trying to get a long-term contract done.”

The village and the union are allowed to file exceptions to the administrative law judge’s recommended decision and order within 30 days.

Hermanek also said, for now, the village will not rescind its termination letters to firefighters, since it still is waiting on a ruling from the Illinois Court of Appeals.

“We’re not going to remove the termination notices, but we will continue to bargain,” Hermanek said.

North Riverside filed a lawsuit in circuit court in October 2014 after declaring it had reached an impasse in negotiations with the fire union.

The village at the time filed a motion asking Circuit Court Judge Diane Larsen to rule on its claim that it had the authority to unilaterally terminate the union contract. Larsen ruled that she didn’t have jurisdiction because the village had not exhausted all avenues for remedies, which included arbitration by the ILRB.

Hermanek contended that Larsen made her ruling believing the village to be right, legally speaking, but didn’t wish to overturn decades of labor law precedent.

The appellate court could decide to send the matter back to Larsen or it could make a ruling on its own that the village has the right to terminate the union contract, though that would be unlikely, according to Berry.

“The chances of that are, like, zero,” he said.

thanks Dan

Previous posts can be viewed HERE

Tags: Burt Odelson, North Riverside considers privatizing the fire department, North Riverside files lawsuit in hopes of privatizing the fire department, North Riverside Fire Department, North Riverside Firefighters Union Local 2714, North Riverside Mayor Hubert Hermanek Jr., Paramedic Services of Illinois, village engages in unfair labor practices against fire department

Firefighters collect water for residents of Flint, MI

Jan 31

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News | Comments off

Excerpts from the RBlandmark.com:

In the wake of the water crisis in Flint, Michigan, the North Riverside Fire Department has donated 75 cases of bottled water, amounting to 2,652 bottles, as part of a drive conducted by the Buffalo Grove Police Department.

On Jan. 30, the water was to be delivered to the Flint police and fire departments for distribution to residents there. Flint’s drinking water has been tainted by extremely high levels of lead following a 2014 switch in their water supply from Lake Huron to the Flint River, a move made in the name of cost-cutting but without proper controls to ensure that lead in the pipes didn’t end up in the water.

The crisis is the subject of investigations by both the Michigan Attorney general and the U.S. Department of Justice.

thanks Dan

Articles about other area collections HERE and HERE

Tags: Buffalo Grove Police Department, Firefighters collect water for residents of Flint MI, North Riverside Fire Department, Police officers and firefighters collect water for residents of Flint MI, water contamination in Flint MI

American Lung Association Fight for Air Climb

Jan 30

Posted by Admin in Fire Service News | Comments off

Excerpts from theChicagoTribune.com:

North Riverside Fire Department Firefighter Richard Gray will march up 31 flights of stairs in the Oakbrook Terrace Tower on Feb. 14 as part of the American Lung Assn.’s Fight for Air Climb fundraiser. For the sixth year in a row, the 48-year-old is participating in the annual event to benefit lung disease research, patient services, and advocacy efforts.

The cause resonates personally for Gray, whose 72-year-old father, a retired firefighter, received a lung transplant in 2010. “He’s doing fantastic,” Gray said. However, Gray lost both his mother-in-law and an uncle to lung disease.

He’ll strap on 60 pounds of firefighting gear and climb the 680 steps in the office building as part of a team of firefighters from his department participating in the event. Fire departments in the Chicagoland area take part every year in the Fight for Air Climb at the Oakbrook Terrace Tower as well as the climb at the Presidential Towers in Chicago’s West Loop, set for March 6. The fundraiser sparks friendly competition among teammates as well as between Chicagoland fire departments, Gray said.

Lung cancer is the number one cancer killer in the county, taking the lives of an estimated 158,040 Americans in 2015, according to the American Lung Assn. Along with patient education and advocacy, proceeds from the Fight for Air Climb fund additional studies on lung disease.

The Fight for Air Climb is a nationwide event, held in skyscrapers, stadiums and other buildings throughout the U.S. The nationwide fundraising goal is $9 million this year. Both the Oakbrook Terrace Tower climb and the Presidential Towers climb raise funds toward that total, with respective goals of $210,000 and $500,000.

Participants must commit to raising $100, though most raise a lot more. Asking 15 people for a penny for each of the 680 stairs in the Oakbrook Terrace Tower, or $6.80, is an easy way to exceed the individual fundraising commitment, event organizers point out.

thanks Dan

Tags: American Lung Assn.'s Fight for Air Climb, American Lung Association Fight for Air Climb, Firefighter Richard Gray, North Riverside Fire Department

North Riverside considers privatizing FD (more)

Oct 16

Posted by Admin in Fire Department News, Fire Service News | 1 Comment

Excerpts from the Riverside-BrookfieldLandmark.com:

A Cook County judge has punted on the question of whether the village of North Riverside has the right to summarily terminate its contract with union firefighters and replace them with private firm.

On Thursday afternoon, Judge Diane Larsen also ensured the question won’t be decided at the circuit court level. A hearing whose outcome might have set a precedent for Illinois labor law instead lasted all of five minutes, with Larsen ruling the circuit court had no jurisdiction over the matter.

Instead, Larsen stated, the Illinois Labor Relations Board should be the venue where the village should have made its case before turning to the courts.

“There must be an exhaustion of remedies, and that has not occurred,” Larsen said.

The village had filed its suit seeking termination of its contract with the union in September 2014.

Burt Odelson, the attorney representing the village of North Riverside, disagreed with Larsen’s ruling, claiming the circuit court does have jurisdiction to make rulings on contracts. He will file a notice of appeal of Larsen’s decision regarding the jurisdictional question on Friday and ask the Illinois Court of Appeals for an expedited briefing schedule.

“All I’m asking them to do is to say the [circuit] court has jurisdiction to state whether it’s a valid contract,” Odelson said. “I think [Larsen] was incredibly wrong by not hearing the case.”

It’s unclear how quickly the appellate court will take up the matter. But looming in the future for the village is an appearance with the firefighters union before the Illinois Labor Relations Board in mid-December. That hearing will address an unfair labor practice complaint filed against the village in December 2014, alleging that village officials failed to bargain in good faith on a new union contract following the expiration of the prior contract at the end of April 2014. That complaint also alleged that the village retaliated against union employees who engaged in protected union activities.

The village insists it did bargain in good faith and that the two sides reached an impasse in negotiations, which led to the village’s decision to seek unilateral termination of its contract with union firefighters and replace them with employees from Paramedic Services of Illinois (PSI).

Another matter the village faces is contract arbitration, which Odelson insists is moot. “We did go to the table; we reached an impasse. We declared the contract is over,” Odelson said. “We went to the table, we’re not going to the table [again].”

However, a ruling made by Larsen last December would appear to argue against that interpretation. Larsen in December 2014 denied a motion by the village to delay contract arbitration and sent the matter to the Illinois Labor Relations Board.

An arbitrator was chosen and both sides appeared before him in January. The village participated in the arbitration hearing under protest. Odelson at that time filed motions with the arbitrator to both stay arbitration and to dismiss it.

Arbitrator Robert Brookins put the arbitration proceedings on on hold pending a decision by the circuit court, but he didn’t dismiss them.

Now that Larsen has ruled she doesn’t have jurisdiction, the village must engage in the arbitration process, which is spelled out by state law, said J. Dale Berry, the attorney for North Riverside Firefighters Union Local 2714.

“They wanted the court to approve their construct of [Illinois labor law] and to terminate interest arbitration, the contract and the employees and to substitute them with PSI,” Berry said. “Now what’s in place is mandatory language in the [Illinois Labor Relations] act.